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HARVARD COLLEGE, 



OCTOBER 6, 1870 



BY E; R. HOAR. 



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TOLMAN & WHITE, PRINTERS, 221 WASHINGTON ST.. BOSTON. 

1870. 



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ADDRESS 



AT THE 



LAYING OF THE CORNER STONE 



OF THE 



MEMORIAL HALL, 



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HARVARD COLLEGE, 

OCTOBER 6, 1870. 



BY E. R. HOAR. 



TOLMAN & WHITE, PRINTERS, 221 WASHINGTON ST., BOSTON. 

1870. 



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ADDEESS 



I have been asked by the Committee having charge of 
these ceremonies to say a few words on this occasion. 

It has seemed srood to the Alumni and friends of Harvard 
College to erect a durable memorial to those of her sons 
who fell in the service of their country in the war of the 
rebellion. An impressive and fitting tribute to their worth 
has been already provided in the two volumes of Harvard 
Memorial Biographies ; books which take a high place in 
heroic literature, and which are read with inino'led tears and 
thanksgiving. 

In 18G5, at the close of the war, with solemn pomp, and 
stately procession, with prayer and praises to God, and 
music and eloquence, and splendid poetry, the College 
welcomed her returning sons, who came back from many a 
hard-fought field and blood-stained deck with the wreath of 
victory on their brows ; and crowned them with her bene- 
diction. Xo one whose privilege it was to witness it will 
ever forget that touching spectacle, when the long proces- 
sion of the Alumni opened to receive the surviving soldiers, 
in whose ranks Colonel and sergeant, Admiral and surgeon, 
Major-General and private marched indiscriminately to- 



gether as classmates. Each had his own honorable distinc- 
tion of service, of danger or hardship, prison or hospital, 
mutilation or wounds ; while to all alike belonged the com- 
mon glory, that the country was saved, and they had helped 
to save her. In that commemoration the language of pride 
and gratitude seemed to be well-uisrh exhausted ; and with 
welcome and praises to the living were mingled tender and 
reverent memories of the dead. 

But to those who went to the war, and did not return ; 
who had paid in full the great price of the nation's safety ; 
who had only trusted, and believed in, and died for that 
future of peace and freedom which they were never to see, 
but which we live to share and enjoy ; it was felt that 
something more was due. They had — 

" crossed the tide 
" Of life, where it was narrow, deep, and clear." 

They had passed beyond pageants and eulogies ; and had 
gone without knowing how we loved and honored them. 
A monument in the college grounds, first suggested by 
President Walker, was soon proposed ; and the proposi- 
tion met with general favor. But the question remained, 
on what form of monumental structure should their names 
be most fitly inscribed, and how should it be made to bear 
the most durable and impressive record of their virtues. 
The practical answer found is the occasion of our assembling 
here to-day. 



This is not a place of sepulture. In many a city and vil- 
lage funeral rites have been solemnly performed over their 
bodies ; and the places where they repose have in many 
cases been marked by votive tablet or monumental stone. 
This is not indeed true of all. Thucydides tells us that 
the Athenians always buried in the public sepulchre, in the 
fairest suburb of the city, those who had fallen in the wars, 
except those who fell at Marathon ; who, as a higher dis- 
tinction, were buried where they fell. Their valor had 
saved Greece in its stru<™*le for national existence. There 
are sons of Harvard, who, in the war which involved a 
similar issue, have found such graves. None have had 
more honorable burial. 

" Where should the soldier rest, but where he fell? " 

It is not with funeral ceremonies then that we have any 
longer to do. The war, with its actors and its victims, its suf- 
ferings and terrible losses, and its grand results, is passing 
into Historv. There is nothing here to remind us of wounds 
and carnage, of the frail and perishing body. Our memo- 
rial is of the unconquerable spirit ; of the heroic character ; 
of immortal deeds. And we therefore gladly accept the 
opportunity that offers to fix the names and memory of our 
young heroes, in the most effective manner, among the per- 
manent influences of this institution. 

Harvard College appears to be entering on a new era. 
With increasing numbers, and enlarged resources, with 



(3 



plans for a higher and more liberal education, its friends 
look hopefully forward to wider relations and a larger use- 
fulness. Its Halls are now insufficient for its wants ; and 
buildings for the commencement exercises, for all its public 
days and services, and for meetings of the Alumni, have be- 
come a pressing necessity. To meet this want, it has been 
determined to make the monument which we erect assume 
the form of a Memorial Hall ; the largest and stateliest 
building belonging to the University ; of impressive archi- 
tecture ; of solid and enduring fabric ; prepared to stand 
for centuries. One part of it is to have the form and uses 
of a theatre, where the honors of the University shall be 
conferred, and from which our Alma Mater shall year by 
year send forth the ever lengthening procession of the youth 
whom she has trained to a truer manhood. On the other 
side is to rise the Hall of the Alumni, adorned with por- 
traits and statues of the benefactors who have endowed this 
ancient seat of learning, and of those who have made its 
name illustrious ; where, for unnumbered years, her sons 
shall from time to time assemble, to renew the recollections 
of youth, to strengthen the ties of friendship, to rejoice in 
the prosperity of their common mother, and to bring their 
honors and their fame to adorn her fair brow. While be- 
tween them, the entrance to both, the central figure, giving 
name and character to the whole pile, shall stand the monu- 
mental hall; lending dignity to academic ceremonies, and a 
loftier inspiration to every festival; beautiful, as we hope, 



by the art of the sculptor, but grand and majestic, as we 
know, with immortal names and heroic memories ; the 
Heart of the college ; around which shall cluster all her 
proudest and dearest associations ; a record, a memorial, — 
but also an admonition to duty, a perpetual incentive to 
noble effort. 

The execution of this plan required a large expenditure, 
and you have heard what a liberal response has been made 
to the call for money. The rich have given of their wealth, 
and the poor of their poverty. Few subscriptions have ever 
been raised that were so generally and so truly the tribute 
of affection. Means are already secured which, in the judg- 
ment of the committee in charge of the enterprise, will 
warrant a beginning ; they cannot doubt that all which are 
needed will yet be supplied ; and now we have come to- 
gether to witness the la vino- of the corner stone. 

I do not think a great deal of talking about what we are 
going to do is usually commendable. But the laying of 
corner stones is in some sort the business of a University — 
and it is never inopportune for the friends of this institution 
to consider upon what foundations Harvard College desires 
to build. Its founders sought to establish a Christian Com- 
monwealth, for the service of God, and the highest good of 
man. The two mottoes, successively placed upon the col- 
lege seal, — "Veritas" — and "Christo et ecclesiae" — indi- 
cate their idea of the standard and test of character, and 
of the uses of life. To be true in thought, true in act, true 



8 



to conviction, true to duty, this is the first lesson which 
Harvard seeks to teach. And next the lesson of public 
duty ; the devotion of all faculties, and powers, and posses- 
sions, to the service of mankind. She would consecrate all 
her sons to him w T ho served and died for men ; and enrol 
them in that great company of the faithful, whose confessors 
and martyrs have followed in the same footsteps. The ideal 
which she would set before them is found in that lofty senti- 
ment of the first sentence of the " assembly's catechism," 
than which a nobler statement of man's duty and destiny was 
never penned, — " The chief end of man is to glorify God, 
and enjoy Him forever." And so the stately building which 
w r e raise shall stand to attest for this college the belief that 
men were not placed on the earth for their own pleasure, 
not merely to buy and sell and get gain, to live in fair 
houses and occup3 r high places, to be clothed in purple and 
fine linen and fare sumptuously every day, to be flattered 
and pampered and served ; not even to store their minds 
with knowledge, and enrich them with the treasures of let- 
ters and of art ; but to live bravely and uprightly, walking 
in the ways of truth and duty. Our wisest scholars w T ere 
those who earliest and best learned this noblest lesson ; and 
we inscribe their names in our highest place of honor, to be 
the example and stimulus of all who shall come after them. 
The object of education is to make men ; and the noblest 
manhood was by them illustrated. 

Let it not be thought that we claim any monopoly of 



9 



glory, or are unmindful of the just renown of others. 
Other colleges have clone, it may be, as worthily and well ; 
and they too have, or will have, their monuments and me- 
morials. I am glad to know that monuments to the soldiers 
are going up all over the country. In the gigantic struggle 
in which the nation was engaged, the share which any single 
class, or community, or society? or institution, could con- 
tribute to the whole result, must appear small. America 
has proved herself rich in heroes ; and like so many of her 
other blessings, God seems to have sent them broadcast over 
all her soil. From many a lonely valley and mountain farm, 
from factory and workbench, from the marts of trade, the 
miner's gallery, and the deck of the fisherman, myriads of 
the brave and faithful came forth, willing to die that their 
country might live. It is still a satisfaction to know that 
the University, which is the oldest in the land, and which 
aims to keep step with its advancing greatness, has not been 
behind her sister colleges in patriotic zeal, or in the number 
or quality of her contributions to the public service. And 
it is a subject of congratulation to all who wish the influence 
of Harvard to become more extended, and her relations be- 
yond Massachusetts and New England to grow wider and 
stronger, that in the honors we pay to our brothers who 
have fallen in the w r ar, we create a new bond of sympathy, 
connecting the college with every state, and city, and neigh- 
borhood, — almost with every village and hamlet, from the 
Atlantic to the Pacific coast. 



10 



There were about six hundred of our alumni who served 
in the war, exclusive of those belonging to the professional 
schools. Of these, ninety-six died before the war was 
over; twenty-seven of them by disease, and sixty-nine by 
violence, of whom sixty-three fell in battle. None of the 
great leaders of the war are to be found upon our list — 
neither Grant, nor Sherman, nor Sheridan, nor Thomas, nor 
Meade, nor Schofield, nor McPherson. But there were 
many in whom the chiefs confided ; and of whom they spoke 
words of high praise. And we may say of them that there 
were none who sought ambitiously for high commands for 
which they were unfit ; and none, I believe, who were ever 
suspected of making military commands a source of profit 
or personal advantage. Yet, though coming from civil life, 
without military training or experience, there were those 
among them who rose to high rank, and whom nothing but 
wounds or death prevented from taking the foremost places. 
" I do not think there was a quality," said Sheridan, "which 
I could have added to Lowell. lie was the perfection of a 
man and a soldier." 

Our fallen brothers served in the troops of ten States ; 
and from Gettysburg and Antietam to Port Hudson, and 
Pittsburg Landing, and Lookout Mountain, and Fort Wag- 
ner, they fought and fell on all the bloodiest fields of the 
Avar. No memorial more truly National and representative 
will probably be erected, as I think none has been projected 
on a grander scale, than that which we inaugurate to-day. 



11 



In any capacity where service was honorable or useful, they 
were ready to render it ; for it was service and not distinction 
to which they aspired. " Illinois is greatly in need of troops. 
Recruiting goes on slowy. I feel that the call which the 
Governor made last week was to me," wrote Henry Ware 
Hall to his father in the summer of 1861. And in November 
following, "I never thought of going otherwise than as a 
private, until the position was offered me without my seek- 
ing it." He fell at the head of an assaulting column, his 
body pierced by eleven balls. "The country needs men, 
not officers," said Ezra Martin Tebbets, the accomplished 
engineer, one of the first scholars of the class of 1859, when 
he enlisted for the second time as a private in the 5th Iowa 
Cavalry, in 1864. 

The impulse which moved the American people in the 
great uprising of 1861, and which sustained them through 
the long struggle, was chiefly an intense, I might almost 
say, an inconsiderate patriotism. The integrity of the 
Union, the flag, which traitors had dared to insult, the sup- 
port of the Government, were most in their thoughts. 
They were proud of their country, of its splendid growth, 
its unequalled prosperity, its freedom, its equality of privi- 
leges, even, I am afraid, of its size. In the words of the 
Greek orator, " It was for such a country then that these 
men, nobly resolving not to have it taken from them, fell 
fighting." But it was the felicity of the nation that its 
cause commanded the support of the thought, the intelligent 



12 



conviction of the people, and that its victory was the victory 
of ideas, as well as of material resources, and patriotic 
ardor. Our armies were not an ignorant mob, as some 
European gentlemen imagined, with passions stimulated to 
madness ; nor were they the hordes of the mercenary and 
the brutal. As largely infused into them as into the com- 
munity itself, were the graduates and students of our col- 
leges, the artists, engineers, clergymen, lawyers, physicians, 
teachers, professors, inventors, scholars, authors, editors, the 
refined, the well-instructed, and the thoughtful. They knew 
what they were fi<rbtiii£ for. Their vollies and charges car- 
ried with them the judgments of John Marshall, the reply of 
Webster to Hayne, the truths of the declaration of indepen- 
dence. Our brothers who died had everything to make life 
dear and desirable. They belonged to the most favored class- 
es, if we have such in America; for those are most favored 
who enjoy opportunities of the most complete and varied cul- 
ture, and the development of the most perfect manhood. Not 
thoughtlessly or recklessly, not from restlessness or ambi- 
tion, but modestly, considerately, counting the cost, they 
cheerfully put in peril for what they knew was the cause of 
freedom and civilization, ease, wealth, pleasure, home, 
friends, the prospect of success and honor, and "all the 
immeasurable opportunities of life." 

Better than any poor words of mine, permit me to read 
to you in confirmation of this statement a few words of 
theirs ; though I fear to begin to quote, since it is so hard 
to tind where to stop. 



13 
James Jackson Lowell wrote thus to his classmates : 

"When the class meets in years to come, and honors its 
statesmen and judges, its divines and doctors, let also the 
score who went to fight for their country be remembered, 
and let not those who never returned be forgotten : — those 
who died for the cause, not of the Constitution and the 
laws, — a superficial cause, the Rebels have now the same, — 
but of civilization and law, and the self-restrained freedom 
which is their result. As the Greeks at Marathon and 
Salami's, Charles Martel and the Franks at Tours, and the 
Germans at the Danube, saved Europe from Asiatic barba- 
rism, so avc, at places to be famous in future times, shall 
have saved America from a similar tide of barbarism ; and 
avc may hope to be purified and strengthened ourselves by 
the struo-o-le." 



Colonel Porter, of Niagara, begins his will in these 
words : — and Avhere in history will you find a nobler utter- 
ance ? 

" I, Peter Augustus Porter, being of sound mind, do de- 
clare this to be my last will and testament : feeling, to its 
full extent, the probability that I may not return from the 
path of duty on which I have entered. If it please God 
that it be so, I can say, witlTtruth, that I have entered on 
the course of danger with no ambitious aspirations, nor 
with the idea that I am fitted, by nature . or experience, to 
be of any important service to the government ; but in obe- 
dience to the call of duty, demanding eA r ery citizen to con- 
tribute what he could, in means, labor, or life, to sustain 
the government of his country, — a sacrifice made the more 
willingly by me, Avhen I consider Iioav singularly benefited 



14 



I have been by the institutions of the land, and that, up to 
this time, all the blessings of life have been showered upon 
me beyond what usually falls to the lot of man." 

Our beautiful and brave ! Truly with a great price were 
our peace and freedom bought ! God help us to keep the 
resolve that it shall not have been paid in vain ! 

I have recentlv seen a letter from Berlin, in which it was 
sorrowfully said, — " We lose in our privates the flower of 
the nation ; while on the French side the educated classes 
do not serve in the army." Perhaps it would be better for 
France to-day if they did ! Perhaps it would be well for 
her future to have no other wars than those in which they 
will ! 

Who can deny that those we seek to commemorate were 
*' the flower of the nation?" " And surely," said Pericles, 
in his funeral oration, " the palm of magnanimity may well 
be awarded to those, whom the liveliest appreciation of the 
hardships of war and the pleasures of peace fails to lure 
from the perilous path of honor to the charms of ease." 

"Yet among these men there was not one whom the pros- 
pect of a prolonged enjoyment ot wealth lured to play the 
coward ; not one whom the hope whispered by poverty, the 
hope of some day exchanging penury for affluence, tempted 
to quail before the hour of peril." 

"Yes, they jointly offered their lives, and were repaid by 
that glory that can never die, and by the most honorable of 
Tombs, not that wherein they lie, but that wherein their 



15 



fame is treasured in everlasting honor, refreshed by every 
incident, either of action or debate, that stirs its remem- 
brance." 

To 3'ou, the comrades of the fallen, who shared their 
dangers and their devotion, it most fitly belongs to take the 
first place in paying this tribute to their memory. Every 
honor we render to the dead is rightfully yours also. Long 
may you live to be repaid by the affection and gratitude of 
your countrymen ; and to be welcomed, with ever renewed 
admiration and love, to the college which will treasure your 
fame. Yet your best recompense will be your own knowl- 
edge of what you have done. The work is greater than 
any reward. 

We have layed the corner stone of the Memorial Hall. 
The stately building which shall rise upon it will stand, we 
trust, for centuries. It will show what those who reared it 
thought worthy of lasting remembrance. It will speak with 
impressive voice to successive generations. To us and our 
successors it will address the solemn question, "What are 
you doing, or striving to do, for your country and mankind? 
These men gave their lives." In everv hour of weariness 
or despondency, its marble record of such lives and deaths 
shall afford encouragement to manly living, and strength for 
high endeavor, — 

"Giving to Memory help, when she would weave 
" A crown for Hope." 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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